The advantages of tracking a phono cartridge in a straight line are well known. Elimination of skating force, tracking error, and twisting of the stylus in the record groove, all are common problems of the pivoted tone arm. My improvement of the tone arm is a reduction of the moving mass. This is done by the use of a very complicated suspension instead of a conventional arm. A carriage mounted on a track is used to provide a linear travel across the record. A form of linear ball bearing is used in the carriage to reduce rolling friction between the track and the carriage. The track is designed to manually swing out across the record when playing, then be returned parallel to the record when finished playing.
Record warp causes a wow and flutter sound, amplifier preload, and a constant pumping of the low frequence drivers. The following will explain my improvements in this area: